Kingdom Hearts: Road to Recovery
by DinoWriter23
Summary: Connected to Journey of Discovery Final Mix. To save Clair's life, the band of survivors must dive into the Realm of Dreams, where they will uncover secrets about themselves, and restore worlds that have been lost. Cover done by Flautist4ever. Follows the events of Lost and Alone
1. Go to Sleep

**Thank you for your patience. For those of you who are reading this, this takes place after the story _Lost and Alone_. I recommend you read that one before this one. And this is connected to Kingdom Hearts: Journey of Discovery Final Mix, which is still in work. I'll try to make sure both stories get updated in a timely manner. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy.**

 **I don't own Kingdom Hearts.**

 **Anne Marshall belongs to AquaDestiniesEmbrace, who is also the cowriter of this chapter.**

 **Dylan and Chase Enheart belong to I_heart_Lyoko.**

* * *

Chapter 1: Go to Sleep

CLAIR'S POV

Pain. Every step Windrun took sent pain throughout my body. I had to bite my lip to try and make my pain less known. Not too far behind us, Sarah, Chase, Dylan, and Anne were following, taking in the sights around them with awe. I had no idea what they had to be thinking, but I was surprised they weren't in shock after seeing everything they did on their world. One that had been turned into a land of the undead. And it had been caused by someone I once trusted.

"This... this is amazing!" Sarah whispered.

"You can say that again." Anne said before she noticed one of the moogles. "What the heck is that?"

"That... that is a Moogle." I explained to her. I could see why it would surprise someone. It was like a living stuffed animal with tiny purple wings and a big nose that moved on its own. I was still amazed something like that existed.

She blinked. "... is that a pom-pom on its head?"

I gave a weak smile. "It is... you probably shouldn't touch it, though." I told her. "I don't think they like it."

"... I still can't believe it... we're in a town that's not abandoned." Anne then said as she looked at the people we passed by. "No walkers... no crazy people..."

I interrupted her thoughts with a cough.

"Are you okay?" she asked, jogging to catch up to Windrun and I. I nodded, but another cough kept me from saying anything

Now Chase was looking concerned. "We should get you to this Merlin guy." he said, jogging up to us as well. "Are we getting close?"

I looked around to be sure. The buildings were looking familiar even with the changes made with construction and renovation. "Yeah." Windrun snorted as his hooves clicked against the cobblestone road. Eventually, I noticed a familiar building in the distance. "There..."

Dylan looked where I gestured. "Is that it?"

I gave a nod as we started making our way to the building, Merlin's home. And the headquarters of the Restoration...

* * *

ANNE'S POV

"Whoa, Clair!" I heard Sarah say. Turning around, I saw her trying to catch the older teen as she fell off the horse's back, but the two of them ended up falling against the road.

Windrun let out a whinny as he stopped walking. My eyes widened before Chase, Dylan, and I ran to help them while Windrun lowered his head to check on the two.

"Clair?!" I asked, kneeling down to help her off Sarah, but she didn't look so good.

Cursing under my breath, I worked with Sarah to try and help her up, but she was out. So we both had to support her by draping an arm over our shoulders.

Dylan looked at his brother. "Chase, go knock on the door."

Chase nodded before knocking on the door, then took a step back. A moment later, someone answered it.

My jaw dropped. I had seen him in that movie, and various specials, but here he was in person. The old man in a blue robe with a matching pointed had, and a long white beard that almost came to his feet. In his hand was a wooden rod. It was Merlin!

He looked a bit confused at the sight of us. "Um... hello. And you are?" His gaze then wandered over to Clair, who was being supported by Sarah and I, and gasped. "Clair!" He then hurried over to her. "Where the Dickens have you been?"

"It's a long story." I said.

Merlin furrowed his brow at that, then saw her injuries. "And what happened to you?"

"Also a long story." I replied.

"Well, I suppose it can't be helped. All of you, come inside." Merlin stepped aside, allowing us to come inside. Windrun even walked in after us.

"What the? What the heck is a horse doing in here?" Someone asked from inside.

"He's with us." Chase stated as we came inside. I raised my eyebrow in confusion as a girl with short, black hair polished the biggest shuriken I had ever seen. As I watched, I saw her stick some orb into the weapon. There was no slot or hole for it, yet it somehow merged with the shuriken. How did that work? "Why is there a horse?" She asked while pausing from doing the polishing/merging whatever with her weapon.

"That pony's gonna knock over everything and make an even bigger mess!" The person who spoke, an old man with blond hair in a white shirt and blue pants, was complaining.

"Um... sorry about Windrun." Sarah apologized.

"Windrun?" the girl on the other side of the room asked.

"The horse." I clarified.

"So is anyone going to answer me?"

Merlin waved his wand and a cot appeared out of thin air. "Lay her there, please..." he instructed. Sarah and I moved Clair over to the cot, setting her down on it while Merlin began to examine her. "Oh dear... who did this to her...?" he asked, waving his wand again.

"Santos Ceres." Chase growled.

"He did this to her." I hissed with venom in my voice at the name of that sick creep.

Everyone in the room looked up at that. "So he survived too." Cid said.

"You know who he is?" I frowned lightly.

A man with brown hair and a scar across his nose wearing a black short sleeved jacket with a fur collar gave a nod. "He was part of a program she and her cousin were in. They thought he was a friend. But he definitely wasn't..." he frowned. "Turns out their program was just a front for Madsane, to create a group of elite warriors." The old man was saying. "Almost like the projects Xehanort did here under our noses."

I clenched my fist. Just hearing Madsane and Santos's names made me want to punch something.

"Who's Xehanort?" Sarah asked.

"Better asking who he was." The girl said as she stuck the cloth she was using to polish her shuriken into a pack pocket of her tan shorts. "He's dead now."

"He was an evil person... caused the worlds quite a bit of trouble." the brown haired man noted as he looked at us. "I don't think we've caught your names."

"I'm Anne Marshall. This is Chase and Dylan Enheart, and Sarah." I said.

Windrun gave a snort as he looked at us.

"And the horse is Windrun." Chase added as he turned to the horse. "We haven't forgotten about you."

He just turned his head away once that correction was made

"All five of us are from a world where the dead come back to life and eat the living." Dylan said grimly.

"And Madsane and Santos are the reason why that was happening." I growled. "They turned our entire world into some sick, twisted experiment!"

There was grim silence at that. Whatever the guy with blonde hair had in his mouth fell out of it while the girl looked shocked. The man with brown hair closed his eyes grimly while Merlin did a double take.

"... What...?" the girl finally asked.

"You heard me." I said. "We lost our homes... our friends... our families..."

"Because of those bastards..." Dylan whispered. "... My Rebecca was killed because of them..."

"We've had to see people we knew eaten alive, shot, get bit and turn into one of those things before our eyes... we had to put them down to keep them from reanimating as one..." Chase's voice was full of sadness and regret. "We've also had to watch people go insane from how the world became..."

"A-And Santos Ceres... he killed my dad right in front of me..." Sarah added, looking down.

"I had to see my parents eaten alive when it began..." I clenched my fist tighter than before. "And when we found out, Santos just taunted us about it!" I was about to kick something over, but I stopped myself.

Merlin, who was looking over Clair, had to stop because Clair gasped. All of us turned our attention to her. "Clair...?" Chase asked.

"This is serious." Merlin said as he looked at us. "I will need assistance."

The four of us immediately came over to his side. "How can we help?" I asked.

"You will explain everything to Master Yen Sid."

"To who?" Dylan asked, but then our surroundings changed.

I blinked with surprise. One minute we were standing in Merlin's house, the next, we were standing outside some kinda weird tower. What?

Sarah looked around. "Where are we?"

"Uh..." I trailed off. "Sarah, did you see anything like this in the manga?"

She shook her head. "Not that I can remember."

"Well... you think this Yen Sid dude is in there?" Chase asked.

"Only one way to find out, I guess." I muttered as I took a breath, pushing open the doors. It was narrow inside, with only a spiral staircase that led up, so we ascended the stairs for what seemed like ages until we finally reached the top. I hesitated for a moment before knocking on the door. Thankfully Dylan and Chase were carrying Clair this time.

"Come in." A voice said from inside. I pushed the door open, seeing some kind of study. In the middle was this old guy wearing blue robes and a blue sorcerer's hat with a star pattern. He had a long gray beard and had piercing black eyes, the kind that looked like they were staring into your soul. "Welcome Anne Marshall."

That caught me by surprise. "How do you know my name...?" I gasped.

"That is not important." The sorcerer said. "Clair's life is in danger now."

All of our eyes widened at that. "What?!" Chase exclaimed with shock, still carrying Clair with Dylan. He seemed even more worried now. "What's wrong with her?"

"She has been injected with a toxin derived from a species of animal that I believe was of Harthynian origin." Was the reply.

Chase looked up. "Can't you do something?"

"If I knew what toxin was used, then I could. In these circumstances..."

Chase shook his head. "Uh-uh. No. You're an all-powerful sorcerer! You've got to have a trick up your sleeve."

The sorcerer calmly stood up as he approached us. Our eyes all went to Chase, because we became afraid that he crossed a line, and was about to feel the sorcerer's paled, looking like he was about to pass out. "U-Uh..."

However, the sorcerer didn't blow up or yell at him at all. Instead, he placed a hand on his shoulder. "There is something I can do. I can send her into the Realm of Dreams. There, the toxin's progress will be slowed."

"Realm of Dreams?" Sarah asked.

The Sorcerer looked at us. "To understand, you must know of the events that have transpired. Years ago, a man named Xehanort took an interest in the legends of how the universe began, and ended."

I gulped. "Did you say, end?"

With a nod, he continued, "There used to be many bearers of a powerful weapon called the Keyblade. Five guilds were formed, each dedicated to protecting the light. However, as time went on, mistrust grew between them, and there came those who sought the light for themselves, and gave birth to darkness.

"A war was fought between the sides, those who wanted to protect the light, and others who wanted to hoard its power for themselves. The cost proved far greater than anyone had imagined, as the world itself was destroyed."

My eyes widened at that. A single war destroyed the entire world, and all because people were divided? I thought about the weapon I now held, and shuddered. It had the power to destroy everything? That was horrible!

"However, seven hearts survived the destruction, and with the light they rebuilt the universe. To keep this chaos from happening again, the world was divided into the universe that exists today, and Kingdom Hearts was sealed away."

Dylan held up a hand. "Hold on. The manga we found mentioned something about it."

The sorcerer took interest in that, while Merlin conjured up a cot for Clair to be laid down in. "May I see this manga?"

Sarah shook her head. "No. I tried to find it when we came to Radiant Garden, but it had disappeared."

"It is fine. It is clear its purpose has been fulfilled." Yen Sid said.

I decided to change the subject. "So how does Kingdom Hearts tie into this Realm of Dreams?"

"Over thirteen years ago, a man named Xehanort became inspired by the legend, that he sought to recreate the Keyblade War, so that he could claim the power of Kingdom Hearts for himself. Time and time again he brought chaos to the worlds, only to be stopped every time by Keyblade Wielders such as Sora and his friends. Even so, the worlds feel the consequences of his actions, as there are still Heartless free in the Realm of Light."

"I still don't get what a Heartless is." Chase said.

The sorcerer conjured up an image of me, only to replace it with a Heartless. "Should one such as Anne yield to the darkness in their heart, she would be transformed into the creature you see before you. Once this has occurred, you would lose your mind and reason, acting only on instinct. Those instincts would lead you to seek out the darkness in other hearts, to consume them. And when Xehanort unleashed them upon the worlds, they ended up consuming the hearts of many worlds."

I had been listening the whole time, and had been disappointed when I ended up being used as the object lesson. However, when I heard the last part, my jaw dropped. "Those things destroy worlds?"

"They are capable of such a feat, as they have proven a few years ago. When Sora stopped Xehanort's plans that time, he managed to restore many of the worlds that had fallen. However, not all of them returned to the Realm of Light. There are many worlds that still remain trapped in a sleeping state, reliving the events of the past that have happened for each world."

"So that's the Realm of Dreams." Chase said. "But how does sending Clair there help her?"

The sorcerer seemed please with his question. "While she is there, the poison's effects will be slowed. We will have more time to find what was used on her, and how to counter it."

"The light from the hearts of the sleeping worlds will also provide us with extra power to purge the poison from her body." Merlin added.

"Then I'm going too." I said. "I'll help wake the worlds up to get the energy to heal Clair."

"To wake a world requires a Keyblade."

"Then it's a good thing I have one." I summoned mine to prove my point, earning surprised looks from both Merlin and Yen Sid. "This came to me after I met Clair. I don't know if it's good or bad, but I'm going to use it to help my friend, and come hell or high water I'm going to do it."

I expected one of the wizards to tell me no, that I was not cut out to do this. I was preparing my counter argument when Yen Sid nodded. "Spoken like a true Keyblade bearer."

"If Anne's going, so am I." Dylan then spoke up. "There's no way I'm letting her go in by herself."

"Me too." Chase agreed.

Sarah also spoke up. "Clair's been my friend. She's like the sister I never had. I'm going as well."

Seeing the determination on our faces made the sorcerer nod with approval. "Prepare more cots, Merlin. The fairies will take care of the rest."

Sarah blinked. "Fairies?"

"He means us, dear." Another voice said. Turning, we saw that three short women had joined us with tiny wings growing out of their backs. They had on dresses that were orange, green, and blue. I recognized them as Flora, Fauna, and Meriwether, but they went over to Clair.

Fauna's face fell as she saw her condition. "Oh, the poor dear."

"Well, we know what to do." Flora said as she held up her wand. Waving it over my friend, some sort of dust came from it. As it settled over her, her body relaxed, and her breathing steadied.

As Merlin conjured up more cots for each of us, we got in them one by one. I'll admit, I was nervous. Who knows what we would encounter in the Realm of Dreams? I had just learned that other worlds were a real thing, and now there were separate realms?

"Remember, while in the Realm of Dreams, you may unlock hidden powers and abilities that lie dormant in each of you." Yen Sid told us.

"Now you tell us." Chase said. Meriwether then sprinkled some of the dust from her wand onto him, and his snoring filled the room.

I watched as Sarah was the next to fall asleep, followed by Dylan. Then, Flora stood over me, waving her wand over my head. As the dust hit me, I could no longer keep my eyes open, and the cot was then much more comfortable than when I first lay in it. I closed my eyes to blink, but then I was asleep.


	2. Of Dreams and Spirits

**Thank you for your patience with this. I'll try to not be long with the next update.**

 **I don't own Kingdom Hearts or The World Ends With You**

 **Sarah belongs to TellTale Games**

 **Thanks to AquaDestiniesEmbrace for helping with the descriptions. And thanks to YamiChaos27 for your help with the beginning**

* * *

Chapter 2: Of Dreams and Spirits

JASON'S POV

Concentrating on my breathing, I worked at pushing the weights off me and into the air above me. This was not an easy thing to do, as there were several boulders that were bigger than I was on the rack. When I first started training, my body did nothing but insist that my master was trying to kill me. However, I employed the method that I had used when I started out. I just focused on getting the task done.

With a lot of effort, and my arms threatening to give out on me, I managed to lift the weights into the air, and hold it above me. My arms complained, but it wasn't anything I hadn't experienced before. In fact, it almost reminded me of the dumb training things my ex-father used to put me through. The real difference was I was enjoying this training, and my master was someone I enjoyed learning under.

"Not bad. Not bad at all." Tifa said as she took hold of the bar, allowing me to get out from underneath so I wouldn't be crushed. Despite her ideal figure, she was incredibly strong because she didn't even break out a sweat. I still found that odd because she was still wearing the black clothes I had come to associate with her, despite it being a clear sunny day.

Her words were encouraging as as I sat up, the sound of weights against the ground letting me know she dropped it. "Thanks, Tifa."

I watched as she took a seat next to me and took a deep breath. "It seems like yesterday that I was out here myself, training to be a fighter."

"Does it feel weird to you to be the teacher here?" I asked her.

Shaking her head, she took out a bottle of water and gulped it down. "Well, in some ways it does, but that's part of life. Someone comes along who needs your help and guidance, you help guide them in finding their path."

"Except the first time I came to you, you turned me down."

"Well, you weren't mature then. At first I thought you were a spoiled pampered brat."

"What I still don't get is what made you change your mind."

"Well…"

* * *

Two months ago…

I punched the wall of the alley in frustration, ignoring the pain that went up my fist. The place was strewn with broken trash cans and pieces of glass and rubble everywhere. All my handiwork, but I took no pride. I was trying to vent my anger, my pain, the only way I knew how, and now it was not working.

Everything I knew had gone to hell, plain and simple. My cousin was gone, our enemies were out there growing in power, and I never felt so helpless. Even with the power of the Keyblade, I couldn't stop the darkness from consuming Harthyn. I couldn't stop Madsane. Now Clair was gone because of that stupid cube he tricked us into giving him, and it was all my fault.

With a cry I swung my fist to punch the wall again, but someone caught it. I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw Tifa standing there. "WHat did that wall do to you to earn this beating? Or the alley for that matter?" She asked as she looked around. I tried to pull my fist away, but she had a firm grip, and I could tell that she wanted me to answer.

"Everything's just so messed up now." I finally answered. "I lost everything I knew, everyone I knew. My home, my mother, my aunt and uncle, they're all gone. Even Clair is gone, and I failed her."

"So you're upset you can't get revenge?"

"No. I don't want revenge. Once, I did, but…" I stopped as I thought about all I had seen. "I've seen so much pain, so much suffering at the hands of Madsane and those allied with him. It's just one big reminder of how I failed. Clair might've had a chance if she hadn't been around me."  
"Now wait a minute."  
"No." Gritting my teeth, I continued, "Even after I got an idea of what I truly wanted, what I wanted, not my father, I acted like an idiot. I thought my Keyblade and I could change things and stop the darkness. Instead, we only made it stronger, and countless innocent lives have suffered for it. Are suffering for it now, and I can't do anything to make it right. I want to go and help them, but…"  
"But what?"

I looked away. How could I tell her? How could I share the thing that's been eating me up for days now? I've held pain inside me before, suppressed it even, but this was threatening to break out of me. I guess I didn't want to appear weak before someone that I actually respected. I prayed that she would just go, that she would leave me.

I still felt her grip on my fist. "What are you hiding? Why haven't you asked Sora, Riku, or Kairi to help you get better with the Keyblade?"

"I… I… it left me."

She finally released my fist. "What?"

"The Keyblade left me!" I shouted, though I wanted to scream it out. "It happened after Madsane used me. I tried to summon my Keyblade to fight against him, but it didn't come. After everything I did to learn more about it, to become better with it, and it left me. And I know why. Madsane may have been pulling the strings, but that doesn't change the fact that my hands, my body, was used to take the lives of others. I still see that horrible day every second in my mind, and I cannot escape it. I know it will haunt me every day for the rest of my life.

"Clair's gone because I couldn't use the Keyblade's power to protect her. She paid for the consequences of my failure!" I fell to my knees. "Mortem was right. He said time and time again that the Keyblade made a mistake in choosing me, and he was right. I can't keep anyone safe. Clair, Aerith… my mother. If I can't keep the people I care about safe, then why should I try to be a hero?"

The tears finally came. I don't know why I was crying, but the truth was, that was what was happening, and like what I could do to stop the crisis we faced. Nothing. The fact that I couldn't help the people I cared about, couldn't protect them, it hurt more than when I got the scar that ran across my face. Another reminder of my incompetence, cut into my head forever. I wouldn't blame anyone for leaving me there, to suffer in heart and body, to give me the pain I rightfully deserve.

I was snapped out of my misery when I felt Tifa jerk me back to my feet. "Bad stuff happened to you, despite your best efforts. Are you telling me that what you intend to do about that is lie there wallowing in self-pity and beating up defenseless walls? You're better than that. I learned that when you faced Sephiroth."  
"What can I do? I don't have a Keyblade anymore."

"Come with me."

* * *

I ended up being brought here, to the very spot where Tifa told me she trained to be a warrior. No weapons. No special powers. Just the ancient martial arts that she had been taught. I still have some doubts about how I was going to stop an insane scientist with my fists, but by Gri did it feel good to use my fists.

I opened my mouth to speak, but was stopped because I heard a phone ringing. Tifa took her cell phone thing out of her pocket, and answered the call. "Hello? Tifa Lockhart speaking. Yeah, Jason's with me. We've been- what?! Where? Mysterious Tower? I'll get him there now!" Hanging up, she turned to me. "We have to go."  
"Huh? What's going on?"

"It's Clair. She's been found!"

* * *

CLAIR'S POV

Where am I? How did I get here? I felt so light, weightless even, yet I was falling down what felt like a tunnel or corridor filled with stars that shot past me. It was beautiful to see, and I could feel magic around me. It was hopeful, and light, like anything was possible. I smiled and felt like a five-year old girl again. Everything just seemed right.

As I floated-slash-fell down this corridor, passing by as many stars as I could, I saw something coming up ahead. Was it a world? Yeah, I could see it. But why would a world be here? Was I dreaming? It had to be. How else could I move in the space in-between worlds unless I was in a dream? I didn't have a Star Shard or a Gummi, or one of those Gliders that could come from a Keyblade.

The next thing I knew I was standing in an open plaza, with an outdoor cafe thing to my left and a staircase to my front. That was strange. The buildings here were unlike anything I had seen before in other worlds. How did I get here from Radiant Garden?

I heard steps behind me. Turning I saw my friends standing there, but they had changed. Their clothes were all different from what I remember, and they were now clean. When did that happen? "When did you guys get new outfits?"

"What?" Anne asked as she looked at herself. "Whoa."

Her flannel shirt and black t-shirt had been replaced by a black short sleeved zipped up jacket that had the sleeves lined with red, and the hood was red as well. On the front of her jacket, she had a red flame symbol, and underneath the jacket, she wore a light gray shirt that had sleeves that ended just below her elbows. She still wore a pair of blue jeans and black boots, though. I noticed that she also wore black fingerless gloves with the backs exposed.

"Uh… why did my clothes change?" she asked with confusion as she looked down at her hands.

Chase rose an eyebrow. "Hey, I actually smell clean!" he remarked as he looked down at his new outfit, which consisted of a green hooded vest with a hood over a dark green t-shirt that had a large white star on the left side of it. He also wore dark green pants with a brown belt with equally colored boots that had a gray tongue with a green strap across the boot. I noticed he also had a pouch strapped over his hip attached to his belt.

"This is… weird…" Dylan said as he examined his clothes. He was now wearing a type of dark gray sleeveless hoodie that had where the sleeves were supposed to be lined with black. The hood was red and the zipper area was red as well. I saw he wore a black t-shirt underneath it that had the same symbol that Anne had on her jacket. He also wore a white long sleeved shirt with a pair of black fingerless gloves and blue jeans, as well as black boots.

"Where are my glasses?" Sarah gasped. The fifteen year old was indeed missing her red framed glasses, but she now wore a white long sleeved shirt that had a blue lining around the collar underneath a light blue shirt with a blue hoodie, with the edge of the sleeves lined with the same shade. She also wore blue jeans, but had blue and white sneakers.

"So this is the Realm of Dreams." Chase said as he looked around.

"But, my glasses." Sarah reminded him.

"Wait. Did you say, Realm of Dreams?" I asked.

Nodding, Anne looked at me. "Yen Sid said you were poisoned by something from Harthyn. You were sent here to give them more time to counter the toxin, so they could figure out what."

"He was saying something about how some of the worlds were existing in a sleeping state, or something like that." Chase added as he walked around. "We all agreed to come with you to Slumberland."

"So we're all existing like in a dream?" I asked.

Dyland nodded. "If I'm understanding what he said."  
"So why don't I have my glasses?" Sarah asked again.

The younger of the Enheart brothers thought about it. "Think about it. In a dream, do your glasses fog up, or get splattered?"

The fifteen-year old shook her head.

"So it stands to reason that here, you wouldn't need glasses." A voice said. "You can see better in the Realm of Dreams than you do without."

I took a look at myself. I appeared to be in jeans, but I was wearing red shoes instead of boots. I also had a red sleeveless jacket with gold lining, and a purple shirt with a large white star on the right. "So, does everyone change appearance in the Realm of Dreams?"

"Not everyone." The voice said again.

The elder of the brothers looked around. "Could you please come out, unless you're a disembodied voice that likes to haunt people in this creepy town from the eighteen-eighties?"

That earned a laugh from the voice. "I'm not a disembodied voice. The name's Joshua. Try over here." We finally saw the speaker, sitting under one of the trees here. He had long blond hair and lavender eyes. He also had a light grey button-down shirt and dark grey pants. That made me wonder in confusion, why didn't we see him before? He looked normal, except… I don't know. My adventures had taught me that anything was possible.

My friend frowned at that. "Joshua? A universe of names, and it had to be Joshua?"

"She used to be bullied by someone with that name." Chase explained to me.

The new guy, Joshua, shook his head at that. "I'm sorry to hear that, but I'm not here to cause trouble. You could say I'm here to help you through Traverse Town."  
"THIS is Traverse Town?" I asked. "I've heard of it, but I thought it was in the Realm of Light."

The boy looked at me as he stood up. "Traverse Town is a unique place. It's neither here nor there. It appears to those who need to find their way here. Kind of like an oasis in the universe. I didn't get your names, though."

"I'm Sarah." Sarah started off. "These are my friends Clair and Anne, and the two brothers are Dylan and Chase."

"Nice to meet all of you." Joshua said.

Dylan looked at him with suspicion in his eye. "How do you know so much about this place, or how things work here?"

The guy just chuckled. "I've been here a while. I've had to learn all the details myself, so consider yourselves fortunate that now you've got a guide who can show you the ropes."

He started to walk off, but we chose to follow him. It was unspoken, but we could tell he knew more than we did, so it seemed like the smart thing to do. However, we hadn't taken a few steps before strange creatures appeared out of nowhere and surrounded us. Sarah screamed as she ducked behind me. "What are they?" She asked. "Heartless?"

"No, they're not Heartless." I said. "I'm not even sure what they are."

"Dream Eaters." Joshua said, earning looks from all of us. "They're the residents of the Realm of Dreams, so you'll be seeing a lot of them here."

The ones we were facing looked like some sort of cat pig things with stubby little legs and horns. They had black tops and some sort of reddish underbelly. Crimson? Raspberry? I'm not an interior decorator, so I don't know my colors that well.

The elder brother smiled and knelt down. "They're kinda cute. Maybe they're friendly." He reached over to pet one, but it clamped its mouth down on his hand. Screaming he leapt to his feet while waving his hand around trying to throw it off. Running over to him, I tried to punch the creature off, to no avail.

"Move!" Anne ordered as she called forth her Keyblade, which had returned to the form I first saw it in. Her Keyblade was once again gray and black. The guard around her grip was black as it curved slightly near the back. The blade part was gray and the teeth were three diamond shaped points. The keychain was a type of gray star with four points. She brought the blade down on the Dream Eater, making it release its grip on Chase.

Another one of the things attacked us in the meantime, tackling me and causing me to fall back onto Sarah. The two of us cried out as we fell, and I did my best to keep that thing from sinking its teeth into us, but that thing was strong despite its size and tubby look. Still, I recalled one of the spells I had learned in the past. "Firaga!" I said, but the flame that blasted the thing was smaller than I recalled it being. "Huh?"

"You can do it, Clair." Chase said as he held his injured hand.

Anne moved to attack the Dream Eaters, but then something strange happened. When she leapt up, she took off from the ground. We all gasped as we saw her do that. Upon seeing how high she had gone in a bound, Anne freaked out, and ended up falling on top of one of the Dream Eaters. To our surprise, the crash from that was enough to destroy one of the monsters, leaving Anne lying dazed on the ground. Scattered around her were some shards that I swear came from the Dream Eater.

Chase and Dylan reached for their guns, but pulled their hands back empty. "We don't have our weapons!" The younger brother said as we looked at each other.

"What are we going to do?" Sarah asked.

As the Dream Eaters leapt at us, I narrowed my eyes. I remembered everything that had happened to them, from losing their friends and family to watching their civilization crumble and learning it had been because of a scientist from my world. It just filled me with so much pain and anger that they had to go through all that, and I wanted to do something about it. Holding up both hands, I screamed, "Firaga!"

A massive flaming beam burst from my hands, incinerating the Dream Eaters that were trying to attack us. The force knocked me back into my friends, sending us crashing to the ground while the attack ended up going skyward, racing into the heavens before it burned itself out. Before I could say anything I began to have a violent coughing fit, my voice and breathing being caught up in trying to clear my suddenly tight throat while my body felt drained of everything.

I felt someone support me from behind. "It's okay, Clair. We're here for you." Chase told me as he looked at me. Joshua was then in front of me, passing me a drink of some sort and a look that said I needed to drink it. "What is that?"

"An elixir. It will help her, but she needs to drink it now." He said while opening my mouth to pour it down. "In the Realm of Dreams, a person's skill set is set back to when they were first starting out. In all logic, she should not have been able to cast a spell of that magnitude, not without killing herself."

"She could've died?!" Sarah gasped while the liquid was poured into my mouth and rushed down my throat. The action made me gag, but I then found feeling in my arms again and I was no longer drained to the point where I was going to pass out. With a nod, Joshua finished giving me the elixir and handed it to Chase.

"What about Anne?" Dylan asked.

The mysterious teen looked at him. "She'll be fine, though I never saw anyone have such a slip-up with flowmotion before."

"Flowmotion?"

"It's a form of combat here in the Realm of Dreams limited to very few. Those who can use it tap into the limitless possibility of dreams, giving them extra power in movement and attack. It's amplified with the partnership one has with a Dream Eater companion."

Anne, who had recovered by now, sat up at that. "Wait. I thought Dream Eaters were the bad guys."

With a smile, Joshua conjured up two images of the Dream Eater we had fought. One was the version we had faced, but the other was different. It had a light blue top and white underside, and its eyes were yellow while the other had red eyes. "There are two kinds of Dream Eaters. The ones you fought were Nightmares, and are malicious in nature. The other are Spirits, and are made manifest from the dreams a person has. The stronger the dream, the stronger the Spirit."

Picking up the shards around us, he continued, "If you obtain enough fragments, you can give them life from your own dreams, creating your own Spirit partner. Why don't you give it a try?"

Taking the shards, Sarah looked at them. She tried to position them in several ways, before finding some that went together, almost like they wanted to be together. At least that was how it looking to me. Overall, it looked like she was trying to piece together a big complex 3-D puzzle.

After making one last connection, there was a bright light. When it faded, standing in the middle of the shards that didn't get used up was one of the Spirit Dream Eaters. With a yawn, it looked around at us before it stopped to look at Sarah. The two of them stared at each other, with the Spirit's nose twitching as I assumed it was smelling Sarah. Then, the girl broke into a grin. "You are so cute!" She said as she embraced the Dream Eater in a big hug, nuzzling its cheek with her own. "You're so soft and cuddly, like a big pillow. I could just sit here hugging you forever!"

"Your first dream took the form of a Meow Wow." Joshua remarked with a smile. "They're very common, but the more shards you collect, the more Dream Eaters you'll be able to create. I do warn you, you won't be able to have more than two with you at a time."

"That's okay. I think I'll stick with this one." She said as she kept hugging and nuzzling her new companion. At first I was afraid she was going to strangle it, but then I saw the Meow Wow's tail wagging so fast I thought it was going to come off. "Who's so adorable? You are. Yes, you are. Now, we need to find you a name. Cutie Pie? Pillow? Fluffy?"

* * *

JASON'S POV

I raced up the stairs of the Mysterious Tower as soon as we arrived. I was moving so fast I probably left a dust cloud behind me. It was rude, I know, but this was an emergency. I had thought Clair had died during the catastrophe, and now she was here, alive. It was a miracle, and I wanted to get back to her as fast as I could.

Reaching the top stair, I opened the doors to find Yen Sid and the fairies looking over Clair, and several others I didn't recognize as they slept in cots. Ignoring their cries, I rushed over to Clair and checked on her. "Clair? Clair? It's me, Jason. I'm here."

"She cannot hear you." Yen Sid told me. "She is currently in the Realm of Dreams, as are the others."

I looked up at that. "The Realm of Dreams? What? Why would you send her there?"

"To give us a chance to find what it was that was used to poison her, and to create a cure before it is too late."

"Why haven't you been able to find anything out yet?"

"The poison is something from your world, from Harthyn. Until we know what, we cannot tell."

The world froze for me. Clair, poisoned? No. I just got her back. I was not going to lose her again. She was all I had left. "What have you been able to figure out?"

"Her symptoms are a loss of function in her muscles, reverse dilation of the pupils, and…" he broke off as we heard her taking a series of deep breaths like she was hyperventilating. "That."

"I know what poison did this." Taking out my holo-screen, I swiped through the data and information until I came across what I was looking for. "It's Mourner's Bliss, a deadly drug derived from the poison of a brugtim. What's strange is it doesn't become fatal even if a person overdoses in a day. It has to be administered at a certain time during the day, for a consecutive period between seven to fourteen days. It's by the tenth consecutive day that it becomes fatal, with the body shutting down, and four days later, the body ceases altogether."

Handing the holo-screen to Tifa, who had caught up during my explanation, I added, "Get this to Cid. He and Merlin were working with Clair to add Harthynian to the computer's databanks. He should be able to translate the data and get the items for a cure."

"What are you going to do?" She asked me.

Looking at the aged sorcerer, I answered, "I'm not waiting here while she traverses Dreamland."

* * *

 **And there we go. The adventure in the Realm of Dreams has begun, and now they have their first Dream Eater. I was going to try and just create Dream Eaters of my own for the characters to work with, but if there are specific Dream Eaters AquaDestiniesEmbrace and I_heart_Lyoko want their characters to use, I can use those instead.**

 **As for why Sarah got a Meow Wow, I got this image of how it would look to see her cuddling that Dream Eater in my head, and I thought it was too adorable to not use here. I hope you enjoyed it as well. So, what do you think she should call it? Leave your ideas in the reviews below.**


	3. Reunion

**I apologize for the wait. This was harder to write than I thought.**

 **I don't own Kingdom Hearts or The World Ends With You.**

 **Anne Marshall belongs to AquaDestiniesEmbrace. Thanks for helping write some of this.**

 **Chase and Dylan Enheart belong to IheartLyoko. And thanks for looking over this to make sure Chase and Dylan were in character.**

 **Special thanks to Flautist4ever for being the editor yet again.**

 **And special thanks to YamiChaos27 for looking over this, and allowing me the use of one of his characters who appears in this chapter.**

* * *

Road to Recovery Chapter 3

CHASE'S POV

Anne panted as she finished off the next wave of Dream Eaters, which made me think of pandas wearing capes. Ever since Sarah had gotten her partner, some of us had been a little eager to get our own Spirits. Hey, it was like Pokemon had come to life in a strange, unexpected way. Maybe more along the lines of Digimon. I haven't seen them change form, so maybe not so much. But still it was so cool to see Sarah working well with her new partner, no longer acting like the anxious girl we had met back home.

"Komory Bats incoming!" Anne called out as she had to duck from some purple and blue bat creatures flew towards us. We watched as Sarah's Dream Eater grew to the size of a blimp, or close enough, and bounce on top of the Nightmares, squashing them flat. Once they had been dealt with, the critter returned to normal and Sarah gave it another affectionate hug. "That was great work, Nyan."

"You two have formed quite the bond." Joshua said as he walked up to us in his cool demeanor. "It is quite impressive in so short a time."

Gathering up the shards that were left over, my brother turned to the guy who was helping us. "Why is it that there are good and bad Dream Eaters?"

"Was everyone you knew good?" Joshua asked in response.  
Scratching my head, I shook my head. "We've met some pretty bad people during our time."  
"And they had dreams which match the desires of their hearts. Every Dream Eater is made from the dreams of all who exist, and are changed to reflect the dreams that they have." The guy told us.

"That's so sad." Sarah said, while Clair nodded in agreement.

Taking some of the shards, I began my attempts to piece them together so that they would form a Dream Eater. I had to admit I couldn't help but feel a little jealous of Anne. She was providing a lot of help for us with her Keyblade alone, and I was feeling helpless because guns were useless against creatures like these. At least with walkers I could help kill them, but now… maybe by having one of the Dream Eaters I could be able to help somewhat again. Though if I ended up with one of the giant killer panda teddy bear things it would open the floodgates of jokes. And while a Meow Wow was cute and great at beating Nightmares, I don't think it's one that's for me.

Then… it happened. The pieces managed to click together and form a bright light just like they had for Sarah. When the light faded, I found a Komory Bat flapping its wings in front of me, except it was different from the ones not too long ago. It had a yellow body with green ears and pink wings. Pinching myself to make sure I was seeing this strange thing in front of me, I reached out with caution to pet it when it flew up to me and hugged me with its wings.

"Chase?" Dylan asked me as it did so.

"I'm okay." I gave him a thumbs up before prying the bat off my face. "Just getting to know Batty up close and personal."

"Batty?"  
"My new Spirit." Looking at my new partner, I asked, "You like that name?" When it chittered in response, I smiled and patted its head. "Oh, you do. Yes you do."  
"Bro. It's a bat, not a dog."

"So?"

"Guys!" Anne snapped at us, ending our little conversation. "The bat is Batty. End of story. We have something more important to focus on. Like what our next move is."

Clair nodded in agreement. "She's right. We can't just wander around the city bashing Nightmares. We need a plan."  
Nodding at what they were saying, my brother looked at Josh. "So we're getting our Dream Eater partners. I take it there's more to this than doing this."  
With a smile the blonde nodded. "Each Dream Eater can help you unlock special abilities that can help you around. As you saw with Sarah, you can link with your Dream Eaters to achieve powerful combos that can help you fight against Nightmares."  
"And what about what I did? What was that?" Anne asked.

"Oh, that? That was just Flowmotion. Some people with powerful dreams can use it to move around faster than normal, and reach places that others can't." As we continued to walk, Joshua continued to explain. "It's also useful when fighting Dream Eaters because you can use it to throw your opponent into any other Nightmares you could be facing."  
"So can we all use this Flowmotion?" Sarah asked while holding to Nyan like a cat, yet the pudgy thing didn't seem to mind. I dare say Nyan looked like it was enjoying all the attention Sarah was giving.

"I don't see why not."

I smiled at that, imagining myself sliding around on railings and whatnot to attack Nightmares by the dozen. It was so amusing to see in my head that I ended up chuckling a little bit, and everyone took notice at that. "What? It sounds like it would be really cool to do." That was when I noticed something. "Wait. Where's Dylan?"

"He went to see the person who just arrived here." Joshua said.

Anne looked at him. "Wait. How do you know when someone arrives here?"  
"Call it a gift…" Concern crept onto his face, like he just realized something horrible was about to happen to one of his favorite characters on a popular TV show. "We have to hurry. She didn't come alone. Something followed her. Something bad."

* * *

DYLAN'S POV

I hurried down the alleys, following what I thought I had seen. Was that a kid? It sure looked like it, but I couldn't be sure. At any rate, she appeared to be running from something, and was keeping a good distance between us. At any rate I was forced to run to try and keep up with her. One thing about living in the apocalypse, you had to keep in shape to stay alive, and I was glad to see that in this new realm I had not lost that hard-earned skill.

Weaving through the alleys, I found the person I had been pursuing in the middle of some sort of plaza with streamers tied to the buildings and some tower in the center. She had dark brown hair tied into two low ponytails, emerald green eyes, and was dressed in a yellow t-shirt, a blackish brown skirt, and brown strap sandals. However, there was something else about her, something that just said she had been through her personal hell, like my friends and I had. And yet, there was a sense of hope about her. Whatever she's been through, it doesn't seem to have darkened her like it did to so many people I had met.

"Hello?" I tried. "Are you okay?"

"Who-who are you?" She asked with caution in her voice. She wasn't trusting of strangers, as my brother would joke.

I made sure to keep myself moving slow, to try and not spook her. "I'm Dylan Enheart. Who are you?"  
"Marion." She answered. "You're not like that monster."

"Monster? What monster?"

"That monster!"

Turning, I saw something very unusual. I couldn't tell its shape, but it appeared to be a conglomeration of shadows, merged together in an incomplete form. I could tell where the eyes were, even though they were as black as night. Seeing it move was like watching a bad CGI figure, like it couldn't figure out if it wanted to be traditionally animated or appear to be 3D. As ridiculous as it looked, I had a bad feeling in my gut that it was not to be underestimated.

As it stared at us, I got in front of Marion protectively. I wasn't sure what it wanted, but I did know I wasn't going to let it threaten her. I kind of found myself wishing for a weapon again, as I still had none, and I couldn't get the shards I had to match up in any pattern. However, sensing that I had nothing to fight with, I swear the mass smiled as it held out its hand, causing a swirling mass to appear.

The swirling mass in its hand was then thrown into the sky, and the figure melted into the surrounding shadows. The mass then took form, becoming… a giant chicken? When it landed, I could see it wasn't a chicken. Or a complete one at least. It had green and purple feathers, and its wings extended forward like the arms of a raptor, completed with two claws at the end. The neck was also long, like an ostrich, and the head was more like a vulture's. It still had the wattle thing on its head, but it was green, and it also glared at me with red eyes. I knew it was a powerful NIghtmare even without looking for the insignia on it.

With a loud crow, the creature leapt at me. Experience had taught me that I wouldn't make it back far enough to avoid getting killed by this thing, so I did what I could. Grabbing Marion, I rolled forward, using myself as a shield to absorb the main impact. My maneuver worked as we managed to make it underneath those wicked talons and out of harm's way, though I did feel the ground shake with a thud that reminded me of the footsteps of Rexie from _Jurassic Park_ , which was appropriate as this thing was just as big.

"Go! Get out of here!" I told Marion as I prepared to fight that thing.

She wasn't having it though. "You can't fight that thing on your own without a weapon!"  
"What choice do I have?" As the Nightmare approached, I braced myself for the finish, to feel those talons or that beak tear into me. However, something hard hit me on the head instead. Rubbing my head, I saw it was some sort of metal baton with a button on the side. Hold on. It bore a strong resemblance to…

The Nightmare was on top of us, so there was no time to wonder about this thing right now. Grabbing it with the fast reflexes I now had, I held it up and pressed the button on the side. Out shot a green plasma or laser blade of sorts that was green in color that drove itself into the beak of the monster. Roaring in anger and pain, the Nightmare stepped back while shooting me a death look.

I couldn't help but chuckle as I looked at my new weapon. It was a lightsaber, just like from _Star Wars_. Except it was real, and green instead of blue, and in my hands as well. This was unbelievable, but then so many things had happened that were unbelievable. Guess I should just go with the flow.

Pulling itself back together, the Nightmare came at us again, but I sliced its beak again with my new lightsaber. That action forced it back, another mark appearing on its beak. Filled with new confidence, I moved forward and attacked the monster with renewed vigor. As I sliced into the legs of the Nightmare, but while in the movies a lightsaber would slice through someone or something's limbs mine just left bad burn marks on this thing. Still, I could see that I was hurting this thing, so I kept on slicing and jabbing.

"Dylan!" I heard Anne cry out. Turning my head, I saw her and the others enter the plaza opposite of me. "What the heck is that thing?"

"It looks like a giant rooster." Chase said.  
"You don't say!" I snapped at him while dodging another swipe of the talons. That prompted the others to get into action instead of letting me do all the work. Summoning her Keyblade, Anne joined me in slicing the legs of the Nightmare. Batty flew away from Chase and began to unleash a cry of some sort that seemed to daze the Nightmare I was facing. Sarah got on Nyan, and the two began to bounce around the rooster thing, doing noticeable damage. Even Clair pulled out her bow and arrows, which had for some reason come with her while my brother and I had lost our guns, and shot some of them at the monster.

Roaring in pain, the Nightmare unleashed some sort of attack that sounded like a mixture of the t-rex roar and a rooster's crow. The attack blasted us all back while the thing flew up above us, filling me with dread. Swooping down, it landed on top of me, its red eyes filled with nothing but hatred for me. Man, did I wish I had the Force at my disposal right now.

That's when the strangest thing happened. From the sky, we saw something like a shooting star come down, except it manifested into a person in a black hoodie with red linings and sleeves that had holes in them. It also had some sort of markings that looked like a heart with a crown over it. He was also wearing jeans with purple boots, and had a scar across his face, starting in between his eyes and ending under his right cheekbone. Pulling back a gloved hand, the guy went and punched the Nightmare square in the head. That should've done nothing, yet he hit it hard enough to send the creature flying to the side where it crashed into the ground.

I was sure we were all staring at this stranger who had just appeared before us as he landed in the middle of our fallen group, before he got up and looked at us. His eyes stopped on Clair, but before either of them could say anything Sarah spoke up. "Oh my. It's you. You're Jason."

"Yeah, and who are you?" He asked.

Getting up, I said, "We can skip the introductions later. Right now we got a giant Nightmare to worry about stopping."  
"Is that what that thing is?" Jason asked as he looked at it. "I thought it was some mutant chocobo."  
"What?" Sarah asked.

"Talk later. Fight now." Chase ended the introductions as the Nightmare got to its feet, growling at us. All of us rose to our feet and resumed charging at the monster, jabbing and slicing at it, trying to take it down. When it unleashed another of the super crows, it managed to hit Clair and Anne with it, but the rest of us managed to avoid the attack. I noticed Jason pause to observe the monster.

"Guys. Aim for the breast of the monster, where the symbol is located." He told my brother and I.

Grinning, Chase decided to crack a joke. "What? You want fries with that order?"

"What? No." Jason said. "It swelled up when it was preparing to attack. Maybe that's its weak point. Hit that."

Nodding, Sarah mounted Nyan again and the two of them bounced over to the monster, leaping to hit it in the chest. To our surprise the thing stumbled back with a cry of pain from that attack. Encouraged by this, Chase and I charged forward with our new friend to attack the huge avian Nightmare. With a surprising movement it grabbed my brother and pinned him to the ground, but Batty flew over and sunk its teeth into one of the many slice marks we left in its legs. That caused it to let go of my brother, and Clair then got its attention by firing a Fire spell at it, followed by Anne slicing its legs again.

"Hey!" Jason called to me as he held out his hands in a cup, but I realized he intended to give me a boost. Running towards him, I put my foot on his hands and he then threw me up to where I could strike the breast of the monster. Activating my lightsaber, which had deactivated earlier, I plunged deep into the purple symbol of the Dream Eaters, which looked like a heart with extra markings.

With one last cry, the overgrown rooster fell over with a crash, and as it died it faded into wisps of darkness, the body vanishing as it did. With a sigh, I pushed the button and my weapon deactivated. I wanted to fall over after that fight because I'm not going to lie, but killing walkers is easier than fighting Dream Eaters. I could see the others were exhausted as I was, and struggling to stay on their feet.

"What are those critters? Are they dangerous too?" Marion asked us once the monster was gone.

Smiling, Chase shook his head. "These critters are called Dream Eaters, and there are two kinds. The ones we have are Spirits, which are the good guys, and won't threaten you. The other kind are Nightmares, though I have to admit the Crowing Dusk was bigger than what I've seen so far."

"Crowing Dusk?" Jason asked my brother.

"The Nightmare we just fought. What else are we going to call it?"

"That sounds like a terrible name."  
"You got a better one?"

"No, but this isn't the time to discuss this." Looking at us, Jason looked as if he was about to say something. However, he got interrupted as Batty and Nyan were joined by three other Dream Eaters. One looked like some sort of seal pup dressed in a rainbow colored swimsuit they used to wear in the 50s, or early 1900s, and the others… I had to blink twice to get a good look at them. One of her other Dream Eaters looked like a bear, like the ones that attacked earlier, but was brown and green instead of purple and yellow, with a big red nose and a party cap on its head. The last was like a giant blue and white beetle with disks on its hands.

Marion looked at us once she realized the other Dream Eaters had caused us to stop talking. "Oh, I found these three when I first came here. They've been staying with me, and have been keeping me safe from other monsters." She explained.

"An R&R Seal, Ursa Circus, and Kab Kannon. Very rare. Those Dream Eater Spirits will help keep you safe from the Nightmares." Joshua told her when he came back. "You're fortunate that they came to you when they did." I noticed he took a look at my lightsaber before smiling at the heavens, and I got the impression he knew how it came to me. Before I could ask him, a round orb appeared next to us, making Marion gasp as it did. "Oh, would you look at that? It appears that your new friend can call forth a Portal for all of you."  
"Portals? You mean like doors to other worlds?" Sarah asked.

"Exactly. They're how our worlds stay connected." The guy answered her.

I got the feeling I should ask him something before he left. "Do you have any idea what that shadow thing was?"

"Shadow thing?" Anne asked me.  
"It was something like the Ghost of Christmas Yet-to-Come." I told her before looking back at Joshua. "If you know anything, please tell us."  
"I'm afraid I'm not completely sure." Was his answer. "All I can see is that it was a darkness that should've been destroyed, but wasn't. Maybe you'll find answers while you continue to travel in the Realm of Dreams."

Anne had been gathering up the shards that had fallen when we defeated that big monster, and was working on putting bits of them together while she talked with us. I rose an eyebrow. Was she trying to make a Dream Eater Spirit too?

"... how do you work these things?" she said to herself as she tried to put the pieces together. There was a flash as they merged together, just like when Chase and Sarah created Batty and Nyan. Anne shielded her eyes from the bright light. A few of us did the same thing until it died down, revealing to our surprise, some sort of dragon-like Dream Eater that was mostly green. It had a set of wings on its back with the Dream Eater symbol on top of its head. It also had yellow eyes, an orange snout, purple stripes on its arms, orange spikes that went down its tail, and its tail appeared to end with a drill shape.

The new Dream Eater stretched as it looked around curiously while Anne stared at the creature with shock. "What the-" she began, but suddenly, it tackled her and started nuzzling her with its head, making her laugh a bit. "Whoa! Hey! Hi there…" she chuckled, trying to push it away from her face gently. I could have sworn I heard it make _purring_ noises.

"Well, well, well, looks like you've created a Ryu Dragon." Joshua remarked, placing a hand on his hip.

"Ryu Dragon? Hmmm…" I could tell Anne was trying to think of what to call her new partner. "How about Draco?"

My brother smiled at that. "Is it because you miss watching _DragonHeart_?"

"Maybe." She admitted while Draco nuzzled her. She gave it a scratch behind the ears. "Guess you approve."

I then noticed Joshua was turning to leave, so I decided to ask him something else that was on my mind. "Joshua, wait. You seem to know so much about what's going on. Who are you, for real?"

He didn't answer right away, but he did turn to face us. "Just consider me… a friend." As soon as he said that, a pair of wings emerged from his back, and he flew off into the heavens, disappearing from our sight.

For several minutes, none of us said anything. Then, Sarah asked what we were all wondering. "Did we just see an angel?"

"I have no idea." I admitted. Turning to Marion, I decided to make introductions. "Marion, this is my brother Chase, and our friends are Anne, Clair, and Sarah."

"And this is my cousin Jason." Clair added. "You already met Nyan, Batty, and Draco."

"Hi." She smiled before looking at her Dream Eaters. "I'm afraid I haven't thought of names for all of you yet."  
Smiling, Sarah looked at her. "It's okay. We can help you with that."

"All right. Now that we have all become friends, are there any questions?" Chase joked.

"Yeah. What in the world are Dream Eaters, and why is it that you four have some like pets while we have to fight others like Heartless or Unversed?" Jason asked, reminding us that he had not been with us during the explanation we got not too long ago. "Also, where have you been, Clair?"

"You might want to sit down for this." She said.

* * *

Some time later…

"You're saying Madsane created a virus that kept the dead from being dead, and used it to destroy a world?" Jason was double checking with what we told him about where his cousin had been for the last few months. I was still surprised that they were related because… well, they didn't look alike.

"Pretty much." Chase confirmed with a shrug.

I noticed Anne had her fists clenched while we were discussing this. "It's because of him we lost our families. Our homes. Everything."  
"Don't worry, Anne. He's going to answer for what he did." The memories of my father and Rebecca flooded back to me, filling me with pain, and anger. "We won't stop until he pays for what he did."

"And you're all okay with us being from the same world as the man you're hunting?" Jason asked.

I looked at him. "Madsane's crimes are his crimes. Not yours."  
"I wasn't saying they were."

"Good. Besides, we already made our choice. We're going to chase him to the ends of the universe if we have to."

"First things first. We need to wake the worlds up to cure Clair." Chase reminded us.

Looking at us, Jason said, "I was told that's what you were all doing here. That's why I'm here. To help you wake the worlds up and drive the poison out. And it looks like your new pets are going to help us with that."

"I wouldn't call them pets." Clair said. "More like personal dreams given physical form. I don't know how it works, but in a way I think they are an extension of ourselves."  
"Do you have any idea how confusing that is?" I asked. "No more than everything else that's been happening so far." Looking at Marion, who had been playing with all the Dream Eaters, I asked, "Marion, I know this is asking a lot, but will you come with us?"

Looking at me, she nodded. "I was thinking maybe while I'm here I could look for my brother."  
"You have a brother?" Jason asked.

"Yeah. I'm hoping I can find him. And it looks like you need me because of how the Portal appeared for me."

"That is a good point." Looking at the Portal, he said, "Well, we're not getting any younger." Placing his hand on the orb, he then vanished from our sights. After we got over our initial shock, we each followed his example, and soon our new team had left Traverse Town behind.

* * *

 **Yep. Marion is a character of YamiChaos27's. She's going to play a very important role in the story.**

 **I do have to tell you something. I need to step back from this story because I realized I haven't really come up with good plots for each world in the Realm of Dreams. I need to figure out what happens in each world before I can keep this going. But I won't abandon the story. It will continue.**

 **Oh, and special thanks to The Good and the Bad X-Boy for suggesting Nyan as the name of Sarah's Meow Wow. I liked that one.**

 **Edit: YamiChaos27 pointed out a couple of errors I missed, so I went back and fixed them. Thanks for that.**


	4. Dino Might

**I figured I kept you waiting long enough for this chapter, so here it is.**

 **I don't own Kingdom Hearts and/or Disney.**

 **Anne Marshall belongs to AquaDestiniesEmbrace.**

 **Chase and Dylan Enheart belong to I_heart_Lyoko.**

 **Marion belongs to YamiChaos27. Oh, if I didn't get the fighting with the Dream Eaters right, please let me know how to fix them and I'll make those changes.**

 **Special thanks to Flautist4ever for editing, AquaDestiniesEmbrace for her help, and I_heart_Lyoko for his feedback**

* * *

Road to Recovery Chapter 4

CLAIR'S POV

Diving through the portal was a strange feeling. One moment I was in a town, and the next I was falling through space, surrounded by the strangest array of colors I had seen. Bright orange and pink with neon green, and golden stars all around me. I couldn't see my friends, but I could feel them as if they were right beside me. That gave me comfort as I continued my descent.

Whoa. What was that? There was another, and another, and another. Meteorites! I cried out as one grazed my shoulder, plummeting down below. Looking behind me, I paled as I saw a lot more meteorites coming my way. Where did they come from? Did it have something to do with where we're going?

Focusing on moving ahead, I then passed through a ring of stars that came up out of nowhere, and to my surprise I moved faster. What was that about? The Realm of Dreams was strange in ways that make parodies seem like masterpieces. At any rate, I now had a way to get ahead of the meteorites before they could catch up with me. Rolling myself over to the next circle of stars, I gave myself another speed boost to the next circle. However, two meteorites streamed past me, telling me I needed to pick it up the pace.

The more circles I managed to pass through, the more meteorites kept trying to hit me. Wait. What was that? It looked like a doorway, full of light. I wasn't sure where it was going to lead, but it had to be better than this. Positioning myself to be in the center, I ended up flying through it, being engulfed in a bright light.

* * *

The Nesting Grounds…

Blinking to clear my eyes, I found myself standing in the midst of a green valley, with conifers and other trees growing around me. The air smelled so clean here, like it had never been exposed to pollution. Wondering where I was, I attempted to take a step forward when I fell forward. I then realized two things:  
One, that my crash made me sound like I was larger than I was.

Two, that I had tried to move on four legs. What in Gri's name was going on?

"Clair? Hello?" I could hear Chase calling me, and he sounded close.

"Chase? I'm over here." I said as I tried to get myself back on my feet. It was fine until I tried to not walk on my hands. I was able to stand up, but it was only for a few seconds before I fell forward on my hands, which to my surprise didn't hurt when I did that.

The underbrush rustled next to me. "Chase. I'm glad I… what in Gri's name are you?" I asked that because what came through wasn't Chase. It was some sort of reptilian beast, but it wasn't a reptile I had seen before. It had a square head with four spikes sticking out of the side, and an armored back that ran all the way down to its tail, which was equipped with some sort of thick bone club.

"What am I? Wait? Clair?" The creature asked me in my friend's voice while a Dream Eater flew around it, but it took me a bit to recognize it as Batty.

"Chase?" Leaning forward, I studied the creature until I could see the eyes. Green and blue. And the body of this thing matched the color of his clothes. "Gri's beak. What happened to you, Chase?"

My friend attempted to turn around, but ended up nearly hitting me with that tail of his. "Oh, sorry." He apologized. "Could you describe me? What do I look like?"

"Well, you're some sort of armored creature with a tail that looks like a club's been attached to the tip."

"Hmmm. Sounds like I've become some sort of Ankylosaurus."  
"A what?"

"An armored species of dinosaur from the late Cretaceous period."

"The what?"

He looked at me. "You didn't have dinosaurs on your world?"

"We had… dinosaurs, did you call them? We just didn't have those terms."

"Whoa."

We just stood there for a few seconds before I asked, "So, what did I turn into?"

"Some sort of hadrosaur, or duck-billed dinosaur." Taking steps to look around me, he added, "Judging from your size and shape, I'd say you've become a Maiasaura."

That caused me to blink. "Maiasaura?"

"A dinosaur that offered viable proof that dinosaurs built nests and cared for their young."

I would've spoken more but then we heard more crashing. Turning towards it, Chase and I made our way forward to see what was causing all the commotion. After parting some bushes, we found the culprit. Standing in front of us was a creature with a thick body that stood on four powerful legs with a tail behind it, but my attention was drawn to the head. It had a massive frill in the back, and three horns facing our way, and two of those horns were long enough to impale a dragon. However, the red flame design on the frill made us realize who this was.

"Dylan? Bro?" Chase asked.

Our friend looked our way when he heard us. "Chase? Clair? You're dinosaurs?"

"Yeah. Looks like you became a Triceratops."

I looked at my friend. "Triceratops? Is that what he is?"

"She's never heard of Triceratops?" Dylan seemed shocked. What did they expect? I was from a different world, so I guess it makes sense that they would have species that I had never heard of. These Triceratops and Ankylosaurus appear to be a couple of those species I was not familiar with.

"Dylan? Chase? Clair?" Turning, we saw a couple more dinosaurs coming our way. One was something that had a more slender build with a horse-like snout, but it also had a thumb spike on its forelimbs, and a fire mark on the right side, while Draco settled himself on its back. The other was similar, except the head had a bill that made me think of Donald Duck, and there was a crest that stuck out from the back of the head like a bony ponytail.

The triceratops then did a double take. "Anne? Is that you?"

"I'm here, too." The ponytail dinosaur said in Marion's voice while her Dream Eater companions came up beside her, dwarfed now by her new size.

"Yeah, it's us." Anne's voice came from the thumb-spiked dinosaur, though she was looking very shocked by her appearance. "But why are we all dinosaurs? I mean, Marion got to be a Ducky dinosaur-."  
"Parasaurolophus." Chase corrected her. "Marion's become a Parasaurolophus, but Ducky was a Saurolophus. Similar, but different genus."

"So what did Anne become?" I asked.

He looked at me for a few minutes before looking at his front legs. "Guess I can't shrug in this form." Turning back, he said. "I don't know. I've never seen that dinosaur before."  
"Iguanodon." Anne said.

We all looked at her. "How did you know that?"

"I-I don't know. It just popped into my head and my heart said that was right."

"The fact that we're dinosaurs now can only mean one thing." The eldest of the Enheart brothers deduced. "That the world we're in is a prehistoric one."  
"So we're in a world that hasn't existed for millions of years?" Anne's question hinted at shock and horror.

Looking at them, I added, "Or possibly around the time the worlds were first divided. I don't know about you, but things keep appearing that challenge everything I thought I knew about the universe. Maybe the stuff we thought we knew about… dinosaurs, as you call them, was only partial."

"That does seem possible." Chase agreed. "We've only had fossils to go by. No one's ever seen a living dinosaur before."

"Hold on. Where's Sarah?" Marion asked. With a gasp, I realized we had not seen her since coming to this world. Turning, I began to look for her because if anything happened to her, I wouldn't forgive myself.

"Nice to see you guys remembered me too." Turning, I found myself face-to-face with a very strange dinosaur. It walked on two legs, and had a domed head that looked to be made of solid bone. Not only did this dinosaur have the same color scheme as Jason's clothes, but on the dome was the crown and heart insignia that I remember was on Jason's clothes.

The armored dinosaur that was the younger Enheart brother laughed. "Jason? Now you really do have a thick skull."  
"And I'm about to test it on you." He growled as he lowered his head, preparing to charge.

However, I got between him and Chase. "Jason, no."

"Hey. He should've known better than to insult me when I'm a Pachycephalosaurus." Blinking in surprise, he asked, "How did I know that name? And how can I say it? It sounds like something for a tongue twister."

"Maybe we need to know these names while we're here." Marion said. "That's my guess."

"Have you seen Sarah?" Anne asked.

Before he could answer, we heard cries off in the distance. Realizing it could mean trouble, our little team ran towards the sounds. We had to run through quite a bit of forest before we got in the clear, but what we saw shocked us.

We had stumbled across a lot of nests that dinosaurs were tending to, but they were in an uproar because there were Nightmare Dream Eaters running around. They bore a strong resemblance to Dylan's form, except the heads were larger and the horns longer. They were also blue with purple stripes and yellow dots. Around them were Komori Bats that were swooping down into the nests and snatching eggs.

"Cera Terrors." Marion gasped before looking at her Dream Eaters. "Wave, Goofball, Steel, let's go." With that, she charged in with her partners, running towards the first Cera Terror with a fire in her eyes. It turned to look at her, but the kid managed to ram into it before it could react, knocking it off its feet while her Dream Eaters also went on the offensive.

We couldn't just let her go in and take on those things herself. The rest of us also went on the attack, summoning our weapons and pairing up our Dream Eaters. Dylan looked around for his lightsaber, which had disappeared when we came to this world. Frowning in frustration, he looked at some of the Cera Terrors that were coming his way. Instead of fleeing, he lowered his head and went charging at the Nightmares.

"Dylan!" Anne cried out in fear. However, that's when the craziest thing happened. His horns began glowing blue like his lightsaber, and when he collided with one of the monsters the glowing horns sunk deep into it, destroying it. He blinked a couple of times in confusion before looking up, and seeing what had happened to his horns.

A smile creeping onto his face, he then charged at the other Nightmare and sliced the horns off of the Cera Terrors, which roared in pain at the attack. Batty flew after one of the Nightmare Komory Bats, tackling it before it could carry off an egg from a nest. Another of the Cera Terrors came charging after Batty, but Chase swung his tail and hit it in the face, knocking it off balance where Jason hit it with his head and tail three times before it vanished back into the darkness whence it came.

Draco gave a roar as he zipped around one of the Cera Terrors, as he attacked it from a different angle three times. Batty then screeched, shooting what appeared to be sonar waves from his mouth at another Nightmare Komory Bat, knocking it back. Anne sliced through a Komory Bat before moving on to another, taking it out with the same result.

My friend then glowed with her Keyblade, and then began sliding around at a high speed, slicing through some of the Nightmares, while she bounced some up with her Keyblade. Swinging her weapon, she sent those that had curled up into balls flying into the distance, where I was sure they were destroyed. That must've been that flowmotion ability again, which was so cool to watch even if it looked like it was breaking all the laws of physics.

Suddenly, one of the Cera Terrors curled up into a ball, rolling towards Chase. With a gasp, I leapt in the way of the Nightmare, prepared to defend my friend. However, Batty swooped in and let out a supersonic cry that made it stop where it was, dizzy from it. Draco then flew over and let out a series of attacks that helped destroy it.

"Behind you!" Anne called out as she was hit by a Cera Terror that rolled into her. Turning, we saw that Marion was in the path of a stampede of Cera Terrors. With a gasp Dylan ran over to try and help her, but there were too many for his lightsaber. The Ursa Circus, or Goofball, twirled its arm before it slammed itself into one of the Nightmares. The R&R Seal, Wave, slid on his stomach as he moved to attack another Nightmare. The attacks the Dream Eater did could've been considered cute, but they were incredibly powerful against the larger foes. Marion then leapt up and tackled another Komory Bat, destroying it while Steel grabbed the egg it dropped.

We then heard two more creatures bellowing in rage. Turning, I saw a pair of Iguanodons running over to the fight, attacking Komory Bats and Cera Terrors alike. "Hey, what are you doing? Get back!" Jason told them

"These monsters are attacking our herd. It's our duty to help." The pink Iguanodon said as she swung a thumb spike, scratching the face of a Cera Terror. The blue Iguanodon tackled another Cera Terror, then pinned it to the ground as he hit the Nightmare. Jason then ran over, ramming into the Nightmare with his head. That managed to successfully destroy the monster.

Chase slammed his tail club into a spinning Cera Terror, sending it flying back. "And it's outta the ballpark!" He joked as he struck a four-legged pose, which made me giggle. However, he failed to notice the other Cera Terror coming up behind him.

"Fire!" I fired a fire spell at the coming Nightmare, which managed to destroy it. However, I screamed in pain as I was attacked from behind, feeling horns dig into me. With a roar, it tossed me to the side, and I saw the Cera Terror prepare to charge and sink those horns into me.

It never got the chance, because as it started to run, a massive foot slammed down into it, pinning it to the ground. From where I was lying, I looked up to see one of the largest dinosaurs I had seen in this world. It had a long, serpentine neck on an elephantine body. At first I thought I was looking at a kaiju, but then I realized the front legs were longer than the back legs, and while there were knobs across the body, there were also a few spikes coming out of the back of the head. "You leave Clair alone, you big meanie!"

"Sarah?!" We all gasped. Our question was answered when her Meow Wow appeared in its big attack form, bouncing around squashing Nightmares. Raising her foot, Sarah stomped down on the Nightmare again, destroying it for good. She then attacked another Nightmare, ending it the same way while Nyan's bouncing took out several Komory Bats. I was afraid the eggs were going to drop, but somehow, some way, they didn't. They just floated back to their nests.

When the last Nightmare had been destroyed, the dinosaurs who helped us came over. "Thank you for your help. We were able to get some of the eggs those things took back, but many are still missing." The blue one said.

If Jason had eyebrows, I'm sure he would've raised one. "Why would Nightmares want to steal eggs? How long has this been happening"

"Nightmares? Is that what they're called?" The pink one asked. "They started showing up after the nests were made and the eggs were laid."

"The Nesting Grounds are supposed to be a safe place for the herd to have their babies." Another dinosaur said, an elder one from the looks of her. She bore a resemblance to Dylan's form, except there was only one broken horn on her nose, and her frill was massive with broken spikes. "If the herd feels like we can't even hatch our eggs here, it could mean the end of the Nesting Grounds."

Shaking her head, Sarah said. "We can't let that happen. We won't."

Nodding in agreement, Jason said, "We can help. We have experience fighting those things."

"Thank you…" The pink Iguanodon started to say, but stopped as she realized she didn't know who we were.

"I'm Chase. This is Dylan, Anne, Jason, Clair, Sarah, and Marion. The bat is Batty, the jumping rolli-polli is Nyan, and the others are Draco, Wave, Steel, and Goofball." I did notice that Dylan's horns had stopped glowing now.

"My name's Aladar." The blue Iguanodon introduced himself. "This is Neera, and Eema."

"Hey, what about me. Aren't you going to introduce us?" Another voice asked. We looked around for the speaker, but couldn't see anyone. Then, something that looked like a mangy monkey appeared from the top of my head looking into one of my eyes. "Hello. Up here."

With a scream I shook my head, shaking the thing off, but Aladar caught it. "What is that?"

"Not a what. Who." The monkey said. "Name's Zini. Bet you've never seen a lemur like me before."  
"I've never seen a lemur up close before." Marion said.

Sarah then began to laugh, causing all of us to look her way. "Something's tickling me!" she said as something leapt off her and onto Aladar.

"Sorry about that. I've never seen anything like you." Another lemur, one that sounded feminine said. "I'm Suri."  
"Just in time. We're about to have ourselves another adventure." Zini was telling her.

"You can't be serious." Jason said. "What can you two do?"  
Zini just gave him a knowing grin. "Oh, you'd be surprised. If it weren't for us, the herd never would've gotten here."  
"Oh, is that how it is?" Eema asked him.

Chase looked at them all. "These monsters will be unlike anything you've faced before."  
"Hey, Aladar's outrun raptors, beaten carnotaurs, and big ugly Kron." The male lemur insisted. "I think we can handle a few monsters."

"We need to get the eggs back, Zini." Aladar told him. "And they've all proven they can handle these monsters."

Nodding, my cousin added, "We do need someone who knows the area, and you do hold your own in a fight. Guess this means we'll be working together."

Nodding, Aladar looked at Neera. "Keep the herd safe while I'm gone. We're going to get the eggs back."

"Just come back."

As our group began to follow Aladar, I did look at Chase. "Quick question, what dinosaur is Sarah?"

"She appears to be an Alamosaurus, one of the last of the long-necked dinosaurs."

Sarah looked at him when he said that. "You mean I turned into Littlefoot?"

"Not exactly. Think of yourself as a distant cousin to him."

She gave a big smile at that, and I had the feeling Chase just made her day.

* * *

 **And here I'm using a world I've been wanting to use for the longest time, if my name wasn't a dead giveaway.**

 **Originally I was going to have Dylan's lightsaber appear in his mouth like Anne's Keyblade, but then Flautist4ever suggested I have his horns become lightsabers when he's in battle. The image was too cool to pass up.**

 **I thought this would be a good moment for Chase to appear to be more than a comedian, with some knowledge of dinosaurs. However, he's not a walking encyclopedia on them.**

 **I'll try to not take too long with the next chapter. Oh, and the cover's been updated to include Marion as she will be a key figure in this story. Credit for the cover still goes to Flautist4ever**


	5. Caving In To Nightmares

**I apologize for the delay. I was working hard on my book, and I'm getting close to finishing the first draft. However, I won't be writing much this weekend as I'll be visiting my niece this weekend.**

 **I don't own Kingdom Hearts.**

 **Chase and Dylan belong to I_heart_Lyoko, special thanks for his help with his characters.**

 **Anne belongs to AquaDestiniesEmbrace.**

 **Marion belongs to YamiChaos27.**

 **Braxton, Eini, and Johri belong to Flautist4ever. Special thanks for looking over this chapter.**

* * *

Road to Recovery Chapter 5

CHASE'S POV

Well, the cave was a nice respite from the hot sun. Even though it was dark we ended up moving fast in the cave. I could be wrong, but rushing blindly in the dark could add the risk of injury. It would really relou if that happened, because I was in no condition to be carried by anyone. Unless something was actually a strength-o-saurus, which as cool as it would be I had no reason to believe. Besides, no one had opposable thumbs.

Batty chirped as he flew by my side. The sounds he made echoing throughout the cave. I noticed that Anne was hanging back talking to Dylan quietly. I bet they were still trying to get over the fact that we now looked like dinosaurs. It was strange, I'll admit, but I was enjoying being a dinosaur. I came equipped with my own weapon, which I kind of wish I could test on some walkers. Or an armored SUV that I saw before.  
"So, Aladar. How long have the Nightmares been showing up?" Jason asked the Iguanodon.

"Not long. It started just after the eggs were laid. We were resting after our long migration to the Nesting Grounds, when these Nightmares showed up. That's when they began attacking our nests, and stealing our eggs."

"But why?" Anne asked.

I tried to shrug, but the best I could do was lift both my front feet off the ground for a split second before they crashed back down. "Merde."

"Chase." Clair was frowning at me.

"What?"

"Language."

What was she… oh, that's right. She's not from my world, so she doesn't hear French. She hears… did we ever find out what she spoke on Harthyn? Harthynianese? Hocamli-ese? What? Did no one ask her that? "Sorry. Anyway, maybe they want scrambled eggs."

"Not helping." Dylan growled at me.

"We'll get them back." Sarah told the dinosaur, who had this strange expression of confusion and alarm on his face. "Clair and Jason are experts at fighting monsters like the Nightmares."

The teen who was now a Pachycephalosaurus looked at her, and I remembered what the manga said had happened to him before Clair had ended up in our world. I wasn't sure if he knew that we knew what happened to him, but I didn't want to press our luck. We had enough to worry about without causing trouble within our group. Last thing we needed was for this guy to become another Kenny. Or Jane. For some reason that brought an image of him dressed as both of them. Disturbing and funny.

"Hey guys? I spy with my little eye…" Zini began

The dome-headed dinosaur looked up at him. "Now's not the time for games."  
"I think I see what you spy, Zini." Marion said as she stopped. "Nightmares!"

Sure enough, in front of us materialized a lot of the Nightmares, but they took the form of animals I don't recall existing in the age of the dinosaurs. Some looked like yellow rhinos with pink and purple stripes across them, while others looked like purple elephants with pink markings. To me they felt out of place here, but something told me they didn't care.

Catching up to us, Anne summoned her Keyblade while she and my brother caught up to us, his lightsaber horns activating. The rest of us got ready to fight the Nightmares with what we had available. What the rhino things did next caught me off guard: They spun their horns and began to dig underground. Blinking, I joked, "Well, guess they won't be drilling anything into us."  
"Ow!" Marion cried out as she jumped, a horn appearing underneath her. The rhino then appeared out of the ground, but the rest of us ended up jumping in pain as the other rhinos then surfaced underneath us.

Merde, those horns hurt. It was worse than getting a shot at the doctor's or seeing the dentist. Wincing, I looked at my friends. "Okay, did anyone see that coming?"

"Don't look at me." Anne groaned Draco went on the offensive. Blasting a few fireballs at the rhinos, the dragon Spirit managed to knock them off their feet. I swear I saw a satisfied look on the Dream Eater. Batty also flew at the Dream Eaters, letting out his confusing attack that caused them to lose all sense of navigation.

The elephants did not wait for us to regroup. Turning to bright red, they then began to charge at us, knocking us back and doing some massive damage. I could feel them even through the bone armor that I now wore, and I felt like I had been hit by a truck… what? They were still charging and knocking us back? Two, three times?! Those things were freaking freight trains with trunks!

Clair crashed next to me when they were done. "Ow." She groaned as she tried to get back up. As one of the elephants came charging at us, I narrowed my eyes as I readied my club. As it came close enough, I swung it and knocked it back towards my brother, who buried his glowing energy horns into the monster.

Marion's Spirits also went on the offensive. Grabbing one of the rhinos by the spikes that covered its body, Goofball spung it around before throwing it into a broken stalagmite, destroying it. Rolling around on its ball, Wave and Marion unleashed a series of combos that managed to take down another of the rhinos. And Steel… I don't think I should describe what that Spirit did.

Draco shot fireballs at one of the elephant things, doing significant damage to those things. Annie then raced forward with her Keyblade, hacking and slashing the one her Dream Eater attacked until it vanished back into darkness. Growing big, Nyan bounced around flattening several of the rhinos that were around us while my brother charged into them, slicing them in half with his horns and destroying them. Standing my ground, I lifted my tail and taunted the last of the rhinos while pretending to sound like Gimli. "Bring your pretty horn to my club."

However, as it prepared to dig underground, it got hit in the side by Jason, who attacked with his head. As soon as that one was destroyed, several Komori Bats appeared, ganging up on Batty. "Oh, I don't think so." I said as I lifted my back end into the air as high as I could. As it fell back down I used the momentum to slam the tail club into one of the bats, crushing it against the ground. That was strangely satisfying.

Wave leapt up at the Nightmares, taking out several with her, or his, its attack. Goofball, when one bat was foolish enough to fly too low, managed to slice it in two with its massive claws. Moving in front of Marion, Steel began to fire at the remaining bats, destroying them. The last one ended up getting destroyed by Batty, who I swear had a look of pleasure on his face when he did that.

Panting, Jason said, "Those were some tough Nightmares." Looking at Aladar, he asked, "You encounter these types of Nightmares before?"

"Others in the herd have." The dinosaur said. "They said trying to get through the caves seems to lead to face-offs with those things."

"Well, we came, we saw, we conquered." I joked. "I triple-double-dog-dare any of those things to come challenging-." My taunt was cut off as a loud roar echoed through the caves, shaking the walls and making me worry some of the stalactites were going to fall on us. We looked at each other with worry, and I felt like I was in a scene of some old horror movie.

Thudding footsteps echoed in the caves, making Nyan jump while Draco flew up to Anne with worry. Even Wave leapt onto Marion's back as a means of seeking comfort and protection from whatever it was that was coming. Then, it appeared from the darkness like a demon from hell. It was a NIghtmare, but bigger than any of the others I had seen with a size that looked like it could rival T-rex or Spinosaurus from the _Jurassic Park_ films. However, while its body reminded me of T-rex, it had long arms equipped with three sharp claws, and an extra bone protruding from its hands like knives. Its legs were thick and muscular, with a sickle claw on each foot like a raptor's. Its head was the most terrifying of all, a medium-sized snout with a pair of horns over each eye, and a bone crest sticking up from the middle of its head like the fin of a shark.

Gasping, Marion ducked behind Sarah. "What is that?"

"One really bad Nightmare that we're all now sharing." I tried to joke, but no one laughed. They were all staring in horror at the monster while it seemed to stare into our souls. Then, with a roar it charged forward, swiping its claws and knocking Jason aside where he crashed into the cave wall. With a gasp, Clair fired a Fire spell at the monster, but it didn't do much damage to the thing except turn its attention to her.

With a frown, Anne charged forward. "Don't you dare!" She snarled as she swung her Keyblade, hitting the thing in the arm. With a growl it swung its long tail at her, sending her crashing through a couple of stalagmites. Enraged, Draco flew towards the monster, blasting it with balls of fire. However, the big Nightmare just bared its fangs and swung its claws, hitting the Spirit and making him crash near Anne.

With a cry that sounded like a bellow a bull or a rhino would make, Dylan's horns lit up and he went charging at the monster. Hey, I had just about enough of this thing too, so I figured it was time to teach this thing some manners. Swinging my tail club around, I tried to hit the legs of the Nightmare out from under it so my bro could impale it with his Lightsaber horns. That's where things went wrong for us.

While we were charging, the thing attacked us. It leapt up over my attack and grabbed my club with its claws. With a cry I felt myself get lifted up and swung around where I was used to send Dylan crashing into the cave wall, with his horns embedded into the rock. It would've been funny if it weren't so terrifying. Then, the Nightmare released me and I was sent flying into Clair, where we both crashed against the floor.

Aladar came charging to help us with Jason. With a bellow he swung his thumb spike at the monster while Jason rammed into its side with his head. With a snarl the creature swung at Aladar with its claws, leaving some deep wounds in the side. Crying out in pain, the dinosaur rammed into the side while Jason came around for another attack. The massive reptilian Nightmare swung its head at the hardhead, catching him with horns and crest. Again Jason went flying, and crashed really hard against a stone column. Aladar kept shoving the monster until it had enough and shoved him back, sending him crashing against the wall.

Pulling himself free of the wall, Dylan charged at the creature again while I tried to get off Clair while she tried to regain her footing. However, I gasped when I saw Batty flying down to attack the giant predator thing. "Batty no!" I cried out, struggling to get up. Wave and Goofball also ran forward, eager to help while Steel fired from afar. With a growl, the Nightmare turned and to my shock fired its osteoderms at the Spirits and trapped them against the cave floor. Dylan, however, managed to bury his horns in its side. Turning, the beast sunk its teeth into Dylan's tail, pulling him free of it while swinging him around and sending him crashing into Anne.

"No!" Sarah cried out when she saw that Nyan was also trapped. Narrowing her eyes, she charged forward with earthshaking footsteps which filled me with shock. She reared up on her hind legs to bring them down upon the monster, but as she did it did something none of us expected. It grabbed her feet, stopping her cold in her tracks. All of our eyes widened as with a shove it threw her backwards, sending her crashing against the cave floor with a thud that threatened to bring the cave down on us. A rock came crashing down on my head and I lost consciousness.

* * *

I found myself in a camp, with a box of canned goods in my hands and someone barking orders at me to move the food into the trucks. I blinked in surprise, wondering how I got here and what happened to my dinosaur body. I looked around for the others but I didn't see them. I did recognize several faces, and with a shock I realized I was back home, in the early days after the breakout.

"Chase!" Dylan said as he came up to me, a rifle in his hands. "What are you doing? Stop daydreaming. The sooner we get this loaded up, the sooner we can go back to looking for Mom."

"Dylan?" I asked. "What's going on?"

He looked at me with confusion. "What do you mean? We're looting these stores before the walkers can get us. The herd cleared out, so we're taking advantage of their absence."

"No. We were fighting a Nightmare, in the cave. As dinosaurs."  
"Have you lost your mind?"

What was this? Did I go back in time? No, that didn't seem likely. But I didn't have time to wonder as someone shoved me from behind, ordering me to get moving. Left with no choice, I brought the box of food to the truck that I was remember too well. Custom job with flames above the wheels and a demonic face on the hood. Handing the box of canned goods to the person in the bed, I turned to get back to work.

"You have a lot on your mind." Someone said in a thick Australian accent. Turning, I saw a man I did not recognize, but had a kind look about him. I didn't see any weapons on him, but looking at him gave me a feeling like he could kill everyone here without breaking a sweat. At the same time, he looked like someone who was going to open a string of homes for everyone and give them jobs. But did he scare the merde out of me.

I blinked as I saw him. "I'm sorry. Who are you?"

"That's not important." The man said. "What's important is what's happening to you and your friends."

"You mean trying to gather enough supplies to survive the walkers?"

"No, not that. The Nightmare. The Diablosaurus rex."

I remembered the Nightmare we had been fighting, and that name seemed perfect for it. "But what am I doing here? Am I in a _Back to the Future_ scenario?"

"No, this isn't _Back to the Future_. Consider it a reminder. You and your brother, your friends Anne, Clair, and Sarah. You all have endured hard things, and you are going to be enduring more in the days to come. You were forced to live in one of the darkest abominations created by man, and if the one responsible isn't stopped the worlds will suffer a fate far worse than this."

"I don't see how anything can be worse than this. Unless the Nightmares are going to start coming back from the dead as well."

"They will not, but you will understand in time. For now, you must go back. You are needed." The man then handed me something, though it looked like it was just empty air. "This will help you in your fight against the darkness."

Before I could ask anything else, I heard someone cry out, "Walkers!" Turning, I saw the sight that haunted my nightmares to this day: a large group of undead people shambling my way, rasping and snarling for human flesh. People began to open fire at them, but I was turning to look for Dylan.

"Walkers!"

"Walkers!"

* * *

"Wake up! Chase, wake up!" With a heavy head, I opened my eyes to see Clair standing over me, with Anne and Dylan also looking at me. Oh, they were all concerned about me? That was sweet of them, but they didn't have to. Okay, they did.

Smiling, I said, "Mommy? I don't want to go to school today."  
"He's fine." Dylan told the others.

"What happened? Where's the Diablosaurus rex?" I asked as I began to stand.

Anne blinked. "The what?"

"The Nightmare. The t-rex from hell." I clarified.

Looking over at us, Jason explained, "It took them. Some figure made of shadows appeared and took Sarah and Marion."

* * *

BRAXTON'S POV

Over two weeks. THat's how long we've been kept in lock-up. Ever since the professor's true colors had been revealed we've gotten the bad programs in this system. I still couldn't believe what Jason and everyone else who was a clone had been forced to do. The memory of that night still haunted me, and I do not think any of us will ever recover.

I looked over at the others, Eini and Johri. The two of them looked like narpols without toys, echoing how I felt. Johri had been stripped of her tools and was left with nothing to do, so she couldn't bust us out. Eini, however, had been able to rescue one of her tacky outfits before getting thrown in here.

"Lunch." Jezebel said as she threw the glop that we were now forced to eat in our quarters. "Stop looking like that. You should've known better than to reject Madsane's offer."

"Offer? He caused countless individuals to help destroy our world!" Johri snapped.

"Shut up, shorty."

"Don't call me short!"

"What would you prefer? Midget? Dwarf? Munchkin?"

"Why you!" Running towards the entrance was her mistake as Johri was caught in the electrical force field. Screaming in pain, my friend flew backwards from the shock. Not wanting more pain for her, I stood up and caught her only for both of us to crash against the wall.

Laughing like we were the punch line to a joke, Jezebel said, "Now that was comedy gold. More fun than anything I did to that bookworm."

"Look in a mirror if you want a joke." Eini said. "You have no fashion sense since joining Madsane's Thirteen."

"Like you're one to talk, colorblind-." Whatever she was going to say was cut off as her body began to writhe with pain. After a gasp, Jezebel fell over, and another figure appeared from behind her. The person was wearing some sort of combat suit, with a helmet that displayed emoticons for expressions. A mini-darter folded back up into the suit.

"No time to explain." The figure said in a masculine voice as they began to enter codes into a wristscreen they had. To our surprise the force field was disabled, and we had a clear shot to get out. "Come on. It won't take him long to figure out what's going on."  
I couldn't believe it. A Downtrod? Here? How? Profess- I mean Madsane, wouldn't allow for something like that to happen. So far everything has been according to some big crazy master plan of his, and he used us to help with it. Then again, this was a door opening for us to escape.

"Yo. Braxton. Anyone home?" Eini snapped her fingers in front of my face. "We need to go now."

Nodding, I followed the figure out the cell and down the hall, Eini and Johri following close behind, though the two of them did take the time to kick Jezebel. No sooner had we taken a few steps down the hall than creatures I recognized appeared from the shadows, the same ones that helped Madsane destroy our home. "Heartless."

Pulling out a blaster pistol from the belt, the figure began to shoot the monsters, sending them vanishing into puffs of smoke. While others merged back into the shadows to attack us, the four of us just plowed ahead. Whenever one did leap out to attack us, our rescuer just pointed and blasted the thing into oblivion.

I made a note not to get on their bad side.

Once we were clear, I realized where we were. "The escape pods?"

"Do you want off or not?" The figure asked me.

"Off. Definitely off." Eini said as she boarded first.

Johri was hesitant to get in. "We can't navigate these things."

"I rigged this one to get you to safety. Go. There's no time for explanations." Pushing her in, the figure then turned to me. "Find Jason and Clair. Stop Madsane."

"What about you?"

"I have unfinished business."

"But-." I was cut off as the figure pointed their blaster at me. Realizing there was no reasoning, I entered the pod and took a seat. Closing the door, the figure then pushed the launch button and we jerked back from the force of the ejection of the pod. We were free now, but I knew we couldn't hide. We helped make this mess. Now we were going to help clean it up.

* * *

 **I was hoping to have Flautist look over the part with her characters before I posted, but I decided I kept all of you waiting long enough. Flautist, if you're reading this, feel free to let me know if there's anything I need to change.**

 **When I finish the first draft of my book, I may end up working hard on JoDFM, so the story of Jason and Clair can be finished before the Realm of Dreams adventure is finished, as several twists need to happen so the ending will make sense.**

 **Oh, before I forget, there's still a poll active on my profile if you haven't voted yet.**


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